The BeOS, available for both PowerPCs and Intel systems, provides exciting new features for independent multimedia developers. Anyone who has seen the BeOS in action experiences immediate techno-lust. It's an operating system built around multimedia, threading, and multiprocessing. This is the ideal platform for high-end graphics and multimedia, featuring Silicon Graphics performance and more on commodity desktop hardware. The Be Developer's Guide and Be Advanced Topics are the official programmer's reference manuals to this revolutionary new operating system.

Much as Inside Macintosh galvanized the Mac developer community nearly fifteen years ago with its under-the-hood access to the new art of GUI programming, the Be books provide developers with access to the internals of the first really new operating system in many years. Describing all the development kits in the operating system and how to use them, these books are necessary reading for anyone who wants to design runnable applications for the BeOS.

Earlier versions of this documentation were available from Be in a single huge binder called The Be Book. It has now been divided into two volumes for convenience (and timeliness).

Volume One (Be Developer's Guide), covers the essential development kits: the App Kit, the Storage Kit, the Interface Kit, the Kernel Kit, and the Support Kit.

The CD-ROM included in the Be Developer's Guide includes the BeOS for BeBox and Macintosh platforms. The Be Operating System Release 3 (for Intel Pentium-based personal computers) is not included, but can be purchased directly from Be. Visit Be's Internet Web site (http://www.be.com/) for more details.

Volume Two (Be Advanced Topics), available in the summer of 1998, covers: the 3D Kit, OpenGL, the Game Kit, the Media Kit, the Midi Kit, the Network Kit, the Device Kit, and Drivers and Add-ons. Includes the "Be-Specific" CD-ROM, from Adamation, containing a variety of tools, applications, and freeware designed specifically for the Be platform.